The so-called pandemic winners are fast turning into post-Covid losers, and none more than Ocado

The so-called pandemic winners are fast turning into post-Covid losers, and none more than Ocado.

The grocery delivery firm had a belter of a time during lockdowns.Customers sat at home, with hefty savings pots in the bank, splashing money on home deliveries.

But reality has quickly set in and while some may not have returned to the office every day, they have gone back to supermarkets and Slot Gacor Terbaru restaurants. 

Ocado’s well-heeled shoppers also find themselves poorer as inflation hovers around double digits and they battle rising mortgage and energy costs.

As a result, Ocado recorded its first ever fall in annual grocery sales last year as shoppers spent, and ordered less, from the company.

The dismal figures from Ocado’s retail arm — a joint venture with Marks & Spencer’s food hall — showed a 3.8 per cent fall in revenue to £3.3billion in 2022.

In Ocado’s final quarter — September to November — the average value of customers’ orders was £117, a drop of 1.3 per cent compared to the year before as basket volumes fell by 8.3 per cent. 

The only bright spot for investors was the start to 2023 trading in December.Party food and English sparkling wine pushed up sales by 15 per cent in the last five days before Christmas.

Chief executive Hannah Gibson said: ‘This time last year we were still in Covid, we still had many people at home and the majority of their consuming was being done in online groceries.What we’re going to see into this year is a decline in baskets.’

Analysts believe Ocado will have a tough time turning the performance around as shoppers look to save money and head to cheaper rivals like Aldi and Lidl.

<div class="art-ins mol-factbox floatRHS money" data-version="2" id="mol-217007a0-af74-11ec-8ecb-491bd3f41f9c" website REPORT: Ocado shares tumble as Covid boom turns to bust